Heck, on forums you see it often. On a RR related forum, one thread was filled with terms and acronyms I had no clue what anyone was talking about, and I posted asking where the decoder was so I could have any idea what anyone was talking about. Nobody got what I meant.That's why I dislike acronyms. If you're too lazy to type out the words, you deserve to be misunderstood.
Oh dear God, you are so right. I've even written a text on my computer, sent it via email, then cut and pasted it into a text because it'd take much longer to text what I exactly wanted to say. I wonder what people think when they get those long texts with complete words and punctuation...You know you’re getting old when you text like you are writing a letter!
That's a sign of getting old? Good grief, and there was me thinking that it was good manners.You know you’re getting old when you text like you are writing a letter!
Heck, on forums you see it often. On a RR related forum, one thread was filled with terms and acronyms I had no clue what anyone was talking about, and I posted asking where the decoder was so I could have any idea what anyone was talking about. Nobody got what I meant.
Forums can be so insular that people forget if you don't live there, you might not have a clue of the inside mentions, jokes and such...
Oh dear God, you are so right. I've even written a text on my computer, sent it via email, then cut and pasted it into a text because it'd take much longer to text what I exactly wanted to say. I wonder what people think when they get those long texts with complete words and punctuation...
At one point not long after CDs had all but replaced vinyl albums our local music store still had several "leftover" albums along the back wall of the store. As I was there browsing one day a young man who appeared to be in his mid- to late-teens approached the front counter with an album in his hands and asked, "Is this a calendar?" I'm not sure which was worse--the fact that he didn't know what it was, or the thought that he apparently grew up in a home in which his parents had neither a turntable nor record albums.You certainly know you're getting old when you overhear a young woman in a rummage sale holding up a CD and asking her friend: "Have you ever heard of Frank Sinatra?"
Or another young woman in a thrift store holding up a DVD and exclaiming: "Who's Shirley Temple? Is that a girl's name?"
'Tis to weep.
Oscar Kilo!Heck, on forums you see it often. On a RR related forum, one thread was filled with terms and acronyms I had no clue what anyone was talking about, and I posted asking where the decoder was so I could have any idea what anyone was talking about. Nobody got what I meant.
Forums can be so insular that people forget if you don't live there, you might not have a clue of the inside mentions, jokes and such...
That's a sign of getting old?
Good grief, and there was me thinking that it was good manners.
At one point not long after CDs had all but replaced vinyl albums our local music store still had several "leftover" albums along the back wall of the store. As I was there browsing one day a young man who appeared to be in his mid- to late-teens approached the front counter with an album in his hands and asked, "Is this a calendar?" I'm not sure which was worse--the fact that he didn't know what it was, or the thought that he apparently grew up in a home in which his parents had neither a turntable nor record albums.
From a writing perspective, acronyms have their place -- writing out the full name of whatever you're talking about on every reference is clumsy, and therefore bad, writing. As long as you use the full name on first reference no editor will criticize you for using the acronym in the rest of the piece.
The Golden Age of Acronyms was the mid-1930s. Just about every American could tell you about the NRA, the AAA, the WPA, the CCC, the NLRB, the CWA, the FHA, the NYA, the SSA, the TVA, the FSA, and the PWA. The novelty singing group "The Yacht Club Boys" set these and other acronyms to music in their song "You've Got To Know Your ABCs Today," a popular radio hit of 1934.
Nor Chester Council's Street Cleaning High Impact Team.It's never, ever acceptable to refer to the Secret Service by an acronym.